Schools will have more freedom next year, but concerns about a fragmenting system are real, says Estelle Morris, and teaching schools may be our only hope
The next school year will see a further big step towards the government's goal of a nation of independent state schools, each with additional freedom over their curriculum and admissions and free from any legal obligation to work or cooperate with anyone beyond their own gate.
I've no doubt that the majority of our school leaders will use these additional freedoms responsibly, but concerns about a fragmented and incoherent school system are well rehearsed and real.
The beacon of hope in all this is the development of teaching schools, a network of schools that will work with others to help train teachers and support them throughout their careers. The names of the first 100 of these have been announced. They will build on the training schools and collaborative initiatives of the last government, but they do so in a bold and imaginative way. They are without doubt a good thing.
It's widely accepted that schools improve most when they challenge and support each other; the irony is that although the government signs up to this philosophy, many of the successful school partnerships of recent years have either been abolished or ignored. The specialist schools networks, creative partnerships, city challenge areas: all depended on schools learning from each other, but they are not the players they once were on the education scene.
These teaching schools will carry a huge responsibility and the government will need to make absolutely sure that they get the details right. They are the only glue that is holding a fragmenting system together.
I offer three suggestions as helpful advice. First, they are based on the idea of teaching hospitals, so let's make sure that they do learn from them. Teaching hospitals are all linked to a university; one of their strengths is that they bring together research and practice. Medical students and doctors have the chance to see the relationship between the two and learn to understand the nature and importance of evidence.
That ability to bring together research and practice is the mark of a professional. Too many in government see teaching only as a craft; skills to be learned from those already in the business. It is that ... but not only that.
Education has never had really effective links between research and practice. Education research is the great unreformed part of the system. Too little has an impact on children's learning, and too few teachers use research evidence to inform their teaching. Teaching schools could change that. Initial training should include how to use research and evidence and teaching schools should hold a research budget to fund teachers as researchers.
Second, teaching schools are not a cheap option. Providing �50,000 a year for core costs doesn't sound enough to do the job. These schools will have to fundamentally re-assess the way they operate, and their new responsibilities must not be at the expense of their prime task of teaching their own children. If any of these teaching schools ever felt they could no longer continue, it would leave a massive hole in the local provision.
Third, there must be the right balance between the training we expect all teachers to do and that over which they have some choice.
It looks as though most of the funding going to teaching schools will be commissioned work to deliver government objectives ? supporting under-performing schools, or initial training, for example. These schools will need to be more than government agencies, but places of learning that will inspire teachers and give them a sense of true professionalism.
We should all hope for the very best for this particular government initiative. At a time when "independence" is the only show in town, it stands alone in reflecting that equally important characteristic of "interdependence". I'm convinced that, to a large measure, our future lies in their hands.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/jul/25/teaching-schools-research
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